Mister Mom
by ICanStopAnytime
Summary: When Eric Taylor agreed to move to Pennsylvania, he wasn't expecting to become Mr. Mom or to stumble his way into a new business.
1. Chapter 1

Texas football had its share of corruption. And although Coach Eric Taylor largely kept his nose clean, he would be lying if he were to say he never turned a blind eye to something questionable in his Dillon days. But setting up mailboxes on empty lots or subtly stepping outside the recruiting rules is one thing; embezzlement is quite another. When his first season as the new head coach of the Pemberton Pioneers football team drew to a close, he began concentrating more on his secondary position as an assistant athletic director, and in the process, he unearthed a major discrepancy in the department's figures. Eric's boss, the beloved, five-time-championship winning basketball coach and athletic director - was skimming off the top.

It never occurred to Eric not to speak up about the discovery, and it never occurred to him that the administration and superintendent would turn against him if he did. Maybe the corruption crawled like a suffocating vine to higher levels than he imagined. He didn't know. All he knew was that his contract didn't get renewed, and when he put feelers out to other high schools in the district, he was met with closed doors.

By the time he realized his career was over in the Philadelphia school district, it was already June and too late to find a position in another one. All the contracts had already been signed. There might be some job openings, he was told, in Franklin Independent School District the next academic year, but he'd have to wait and apply in the spring.

Eric doesn't mind working in Franklin, if it comes to that. They live in Franklin's school district, after all, because the schools are better for Gracie, who is starting kindergarten next year, and the crime rate is lower. His commute would be reduced, and the kids are better behaved. But neither of the two high schools has a competitive football team. Three years ago, all four of Franklin's middle schools got rid of tackle football at the 7th and 8th grade level. Too many concussions led to worried mothers and declining participation. Now the schools offer only flag football. That means fewer trained players are feeding into the high schools, which still have _real_ football teams.

Eric of course put out feelers for assistant coaching positions at the three nearby colleges and universities, including Braemore, which has a laughable football team, though he wouldn't exactly say that to Tami. But all of those positions were filled.

"You can always substitute teach," Tami tells him now as she snaps her briefcase shut on a late-June morning. "They never turn down subs."

"For $84 a day? I don't think so."

She fills her travel mug with coffee. "It's better than the zero dollars you'll be making come September." At least his salary doesn't stop until the end of August, because his contract was spread out over twelve months. But he's not even going through the motions now that school is out. He cleaned out his office two days ago. "You didn't work here long enough to collect unemployment."

"Well, you're making enough to support us both," he grumbles as he turns the newspaper to the sports section.

"Not in the manner to which _you've_ become accustomed." She slides her hand over the granite counter tops before her.

"You wanted those. I could care less."

She points to the kitchen door that opens on the garage, where his new Ford pick-up sits, so big the hood touches the wall and the garage door can barely close without hitting the tailgate. It was Eric's gift to himself for agreeing to move to Pennsylvania. He's the penny pincher of the family, but with Tami's dean of admission salary, coupled with his head coach and assistant athletic director salary, he figured they could indulge, despite the high cost of housing in this suburb.

But soon he'll have no income. He doesn't like being reminded of that. He's bee the primary provider for most of their twenty-eight years of marriage. He didn't even particularly like it when Tami's salary as Dillon's principal matched his. He liked it still less when her dean of admission's salary _exceeded_ his. But soon, to be _supported_ by her? The idea deflates his masculine ego just a bit, but he doesn't see how substitute teaching for $84 a day is going to re-inflate it.

Eric rustles the paper. "I still have my pension." He worked for twenty-three years in four different Texas public school districts.

She puts a hand on her hip. "Not for _nine_ years you don't." He's 48 now, and the rule of 80 (time in plus age) means he can start drawing his Texas state pension in just under a decade. "And it's only about a third of what you made last year anyway. Gracie hasn't even gotten braces yet. Car insurance follows, and then college."

Eric peers at the little parasite sitting beside him at the table. Good thing she's cute, now that she's grown into that head, and her blonde hair has thickened into a delicious curl around her elfish ears.

The little girl looks from her father at the table to her mother at the counter. "Are we poor?" she asks.

"God, no, Gracie we are _far_ from poor!" Tami tells her. "I should take you down to the homeless shelter this weekend and show you what poor is."

"No thank you." Gracie clears her cereal bowl to the sink, the pink and blue milk sloshing in the bottom and threatening to slurp out. The bowl lands with a clutter against the stainless steel. She skips from the kitchen to the living room, which Eric and Tami can see from the breakfast nook, and the TV goes on, straight to the Cartoon Network.

"So what's your plan, exactly, then?" Tami asks.

"To keep looking for a _real_ job. In the meantime…I guess we're saving on daycare for Gracie."

"So you're going to play Mr. Mom now?"

He peers at her over the top of the newspaper with cool, hazel eyes.

Tami smiles. "You're kind of cute when you glower." She comes over, leans down, and kisses his cheek. "I'm off to work. We'll discuss this more when I get home."

"I should have never said anything to the principal," he grumbles just as her hand falls on the knob of the kitchen door.

She turns. "You did the right thing, and you know it, and there's no way you would have kept that to yourself even if you knew it meant losing your job. Because you're a good man, Eric Taylor."

"Thanks," he mutters. The stroke to his ego is pleasant, but not nearly enough to inflate it to even half its former size. "Have a good day at work."

"I love you," she tells him. "And you're going to find a good job. And in the meantime…I guess it will be nice to come home from work to find dinner on the table. I want lasagna." She scurries out the door and slams it shut before he can reply.


	2. Chapter 2

When the door clicks shut behind him, Coach Taylor – well, the _former_ _Coach_ Taylor – finishes his morning paper and his coffee. He turns to the Help Wanted section of the classifieds, though he doesn't know why. The world has moved on since the first time he searched for a job, and the only jobs advertised in the paper anymore are multi-level marketing and get-rich-quick schemes. He may be the only person on his block to even _get_ a physical paper these days.

So instead he opens up his laptop and does a little Internet searching while the T.V. drones on in the living room. He types in "Coaching Jobs" and finds his way to HigherEd Jobs, where the only open positions he finds anywhere near him are jobs like "strength and conditioning assistant," "head bowling coach," "assistant women's soccer coach," and oddly - "assistant baseball coach / groundskeeper." They must be squeezing coaches for everything they're worth these days. He shakes his head. But then he sees "Athletic Director" at a small college he thinks is fifty miles west of them. Feeling a hint of optimism, he clicks through. The pay is $20,000 less than he made last year, and it mostly seems to involve fundraising, which is the part of football he has always hated most. He exits out, lowers his screen, and sighs.

The chair scrapes back as he stands. He comes into the living room and rests a hand on the back of their new leather couch (they thought it better to buy new furniture than to move the old, which had seen better days). Gracie lies stomach down on the floor, her feet in the air, her head propped up on her hand.

"What the hell is this crap?" The crudely drawn cartoon characters emit shrill voices and they appear to be farting loudly for no apparent reason, with bursts of clouds coming out of their butts.

Gracie cranes her neck back to look at him. "Ooooh! Daddy said a bad word! _Two_ bad words!"

"What is this awful show?" he asks again.

Gracie shrugs and turns her head back to the screen. "I don't know."

"Whatever happened to Looney Tunes?"

"Whooey what?"

"Turn it off." He gives the command, but he does the action. He walks around the couch, picks up the remote from the coffee table, and clicks the T.V. off.

"Awww!" Gracie whines.

She's still in her pajamas. He hadn't noticed what she was wearing before. "Mommy didn't dress you?"

"Mommy said that's your job now."

Eric rubs his forehead. "You know what, I think it's _your_ job. You're starting Kindergarten in September." The kid is smart – _precocious_ , Tami likes to call her – but also immature in some ways - like in expecting help with getting dressed. He blames Tami for that. She's too indulgent. She feels guilty because of her long work hours, so when she does have time with Gracie, she gladly does everything for the girl. "Go!" he commands in his coach's voice. "Get dressed!"

Gracie's eyes widen. She scurries to a standing position and runs off to her room.

When she returns, it looks as if she pulled her shorts on without unbuttoning or unzipping them, because the zipper and button are in the back. The shorts are a bright pink, but her shirt is a puke green that does not coordinate at all. She has a button-down short-sleeve shirt on, which she has managed to button up such that one side is two button-holes higher than the other. She's wearing one purple sock and one orange sock.

Eric rubs his eyes. "Come here," he says. He kneels down before her, helps her get her shorts turned around, and fixes her shirt. The socks he lets slide. "Okay," he says. "Get your shoes on and let's go."

"Where are we going?" she asks as she skip walks to the door and picks up her tennis shoes from the shoe shelf.

"To buy a frozen lasagna for dinner."

[*]

Somehow, Gracie talks Eric into buying Cookie Crisp cereal. He's pretty sure Tami only allows her cereals with less than 6 grams of sugar per serving – he vaguely remembers her telling him that once when he did the shopping – _incorrectly,_ apparently – one Saturday. But Tami's not here. Besides, that Cookie Crisp looks pretty good. He wouldn't mind some of that himself.

He puts it into the cart, singing, "Dad is great, he gives us chocolate cake!"

"What?" Gracie asks from her perch at the back of the cart, where she stands holding onto the basket.

"Nothing," Eric mutters. "It's an old Cosby routine." He pushes the cart on to the frozen food section, where he takes out a Stouffer's frozen lasagna.

"That doesn't look as good as Mommy's," Gracie tells him.

"Well, I don't know how to make mommy's. So unless you want chili, brisket, or pancakes for – "

"- Pancakes!"

"We're having lasagna." He pushes the cart onward. He can't remember if they have milk, so he snags some. He can't remember if they have bread, so he gets that too. He doesn't know if they have charcoal, but they can always use more charcoal. He'll be doing a lot of grilling this summer, especially if Tami expects him to take over all the cooking. Maybe he should have made a list.

When it's time to check out, he swings into a lane and Gracie hops off the cart. From in front of them, a dirty-blonde, thirty-something woman turns around and flashes a bright smile. "Well hello, Coach Taylor. Fancy seeing you here."

Oh shit.

He has no idea who this woman is.

One of the mothers of one of his former players, maybe?

"Hello, Mrs. Howard," Gracie says.

Relief courses through Eric's veins. She must be a neighbor if Gracie knows her name, and now that Gracie says it, he vaguely recognizes her, from the block party last 4th of July. She's married to that tax lawyer who wouldn't stop talking about the latest reforms to the tax code, the man with three first names, George Jacob Howard or something like that. They have no children, nor do they intend to, and George Jacob Howard is "crying all the way to the bank about that. Ha ha ha." He got the old "snip snip snip" he told Eric one moment of oversharing, and his retirement fund currently stands at a cool 1.3 million, he told Eric in another.

Mrs. George Jacob Howard is currently buying three lonely items – a bottle of wine, a box of condoms, and a People magazine.

Eric blinks at the condoms.

"So, Tami says you're between jobs?" Mrs. Howard asks.

The scanner beep – beep – beeps.

"Uh, yeah. Temporarily. Only _temporarily_."

"Of course," she says. "A fine, handsome coach like you, I'm sure you'll have no trouble finding work." She gives him a little wink, pays, plucks up her bag and moves on.

Eric's ego gets a little lift from her compliment, even if it's all wrong, coming from a woman who is married, to a married man shopping with his daughter. If Tami were here, she'd probably have an urge to pick up one of the pointy barbecue skewers the cashier is now ringing up and stab it right in Mrs. George Jacob Howard's winking eye. Eric smiles at the thought of two women fighting over him.

"We have a job opening for a night stocker, if you want to apply," the cashier says.

And just like that, his ego deflates again.

[*]

As Eric drives home in the new pick-up truck they'll be making payments on for the next six years, he wonders if he should just get a job, any job, to be working and making a little extra cash, even if it's substitute teaching or stocking shelves. There's nothing wrong in honest work. If his father beat one good truth into him, it was that. He got his first job at fourteen, cleaning toilets. But after a twenty-eight-year career, some of that at the college level and three years of that winning high school state championships - it's not easy to climb down the ladder.

He slams on his breaks because the idiot in front of him has come to an abrupt stop at a yellow light. His bumper gently taps the black Dodge Charger, and he backs up. "Moron," he mutters, and checks the rearview mirror to make sure Gracie is okay. She must have jerked hard against the seatbelt of her booster seat, because she looks pained, and she's touching the straps. "You all right, peanut?"

"I'm all right."

The driver of the Dodge Charger has jerked his car into park and is throwing open the door. Eric sighs and unbuckles. "Stay put," he says, as if Gracie's going anywhere. "Oh shit." He recognizes the tall, sinewy, black-and-gray-haired man who has just stepped out of the car: Coach James Erwin. The basketball coach and Athletic Director Eric caught embezzling.

"Daddy said a bad word."

Eric hops down from his truck and meets the man beside the back of his Dodge Charger. It looks new.

"Eric," Coach Erwin says thinly. "Driving a little fast, weren't you?"

Eric stands with his hands on his hips, grateful for the dark sunglasses that hide the anger in his eyes. "No. You stopped abruptly for no good reason."

"The light was red."

Eric speaks through gritted teeth. "The light was yellow."

"Well, unlike you, Eric, I don't just barrel ahead when I don't have all the facts and context."

"It's a _fact_ that the light was yellow and that you had plenty of time to get through it." Just like it was a _fact_ Coach Erwin was skimming off the top, whatever the administration may have said about it.

Coach Erwin looks at the back of his car, which has a few scratches now. The light turns green. From behind Eric's truck, a car honks loudly.

"You lost me my job, and I scratched your car a tiny bit," Eric says. "Let's call it even." He turns and walks back toward his truck.

"I'm going to need your insurance information," Coach Erwin calls after him.

Eric balls his hands into fists and reminds himself he's got a little girl watching him from the backseat of the truck. The car behind him honks again, and Eric waves the driver around. Then he hefts himself up into his truck, jerks down the glove compartment, and pulls out a small spiral notebook where he sometimes draws plays as they come to him. He hops down, pages past the plays that brought the Pioneers from the most losing team in Philadelphia to the fifth from last place team his first year coaching them, and slams the notebook on top of his hood. He jerks out his wallet, pulls out his insurance card, and jots the information down on it before tearing off the sheet and handing it to Coach Erwin. "I guess I should have yours, too."

"Why? You're at fault." Coach Erwin folds the paper, shoves it in the front pocket of his Pemberton Pioneer polo, and struts back to the front seat of his Dodge Charger.

Eric returns to his truck with a glower and jerks it into drive, while, from behind him, Gracie says, "Grumpy, grumpy Daddy. Smile!"


	3. Chapter 3

When Eric's putting away the groceries, he sees the calendar on the refrigerator, with summer training marked. It burns him to see it, and he wonders how his boys will do under the leadership of the new head coach, who has been promoted from his former position as quarterback coach. At least Coach Washington is _honest_ , Eric thinks, but sometimes his ideas for plays are less than stellar. Maybe he should call the man and arrange a lunch.

He shakes off the idea. "You aren't being paid to coach behind the scenes, hon," Tami would probably tell him.

After he puts away the milk and lasagna, his cell phone rings. He answers as he continues to put food in the pantry. It's Julie, making her obligatory twice monthly call home. "Hey, Monkey Noodle."

"Are you ever going to stop calling me that?"

"Not likely." He slides the Cookie Crisp onto the shelf.

Julie's been shacking up with Matt in Chicago for a while now, and they've stopped talking of marriage. He and Tami did their best to talk them out of marrying too young, but now Eric half worries that they'll just go on playing house for a few years and then break up, and Julie will be destitute. She's been on some kind of leisurely six-year college plan. She's changed her major _twice_ so far, burned through all her grant and scholarship money, and applied for student loans. Meanwhile, Matt's working three jobs – one at the art gallery, one teaching elementary school art two days a week, and one drawing caricatures in the mall – all while trying to sell his "real art" as he calls it. It's mostly Matt that's keeping a roof over Julie's head, though she works part-time, too, writing for some political blog. Eric not sure how she makes money doing that, but she claims she does, $600- $700 a month. He used to read her stories every time one came out, but now he reads every third one or so. She has a lot of opinions he's not too sure about.

"So I've been thinking about a second major in Business Management," Julie says.

Eric pauses. He was expecting her to say Women's Studies or something equally useless. "Really? Why?"

"Well, Matt and I were thinking of opening our own nonprofit private school one day for disadvantaged kids who don't get much encouragement in the arts. An after-school kind of school, that would help working parents and focus on art and writing and that sort of thing."

Eric shuts the pantry door and rubs his eyes. "That's…ambitious."

"I don't mean _tomorrow_ ," she says. "But someday."

"Is that going to add any more time to finishing your degree?" he asks.

"Maybe a summer."

They talk for awhile longer, and Julie promises to try to come down for Thanksgiving in a few months, but she can't "commit just yet."

"Maybe I'll take Gracie to visit you in Chicago next month," Eric muses, because what else does he have to do? Tami would probably enjoy the stag time.

"Uh….we don't really have anywhere for you to _stay_. It's a studio."

"We could get a hotel." Even as the words come out of his mouth, he realizes he won't do it. Hotels are expensive, especially in Chicago, and they're about to face a 45% reduction in income, when he gets his last paycheck in August.

"Sure, Dad," Julie says, and just like that, they both know he's not coming.

"I miss you, Monkey Noodle."

"I miss you, too," she says in a reflexive tone that tells him she doesn't, not really, maybe not at all, that after eighteen years of raising her up, he's already a part of her history. It twists his heart into a strange knot.

When he's off the phone and the groceries are away, he walks into the living room and looks at Gracie, who is back stomach-down on the floor in front of the T.V. again, watching cartoons. Maybe this job loss isn't such a bad thing. They grow up so fast, and in the blink of an eye, some other man is the most important man in their lives. "Gracie, turn that off. We're going outside to toss the pigskin around."

"Ewwwww…"

"Football. The football."

"Can we play hula hoop instead?"

He sighs. "I suppose."

[*]

Tami doesn't say anything about his heated up lasagna, other than "Thank you for cooking," but Eric can tell she's unimpressed. While she complains about her day at length, he nods and _mhmhms_. She's having problems with the football coach, who wants her to lower the academic standards for admission for some players he wants to recruit.

"Well, that team could use some serious improvement," he says.

"Eric. He wants me to let in a _D_ student. To an almost-ivy. He took Algebra II three times before he could pass it."

"Just saying."

The new secretary, Tami complains, is flirting with the Provost instead of getting her work done. "I've had to make my own copies all week."

"Mhmhm."

The interview panel she ran today couldn't come to an agreement on three of the six interviewees, so now they're going to lottery for the two open spots, "and lotteries are exactly what I was trying to avoid by holding more interviews!"

"Mhmhm."

The Dean of Diversity is giving her a hard time about continuing to consider SAT scores as part of the overall evaluation process for admissions. "I agree it's not _the_ measure of a student," Tami says, "but I think it's _one_ data point worth considering."

"Mhmhm."

"If their grades are low, but their SAT scores are high, it allows you to see the potential that may have gone unrealized in high school."

"Mhmhm."

"And if the SAT scores are terrible, but their grades are high, that tells me a bit of grade inflation might have been going on in that school."

"Mhmhmm."

"But Dianne just thinks we shouldn't use standardized tests at all, that they're designed to play into the preexisting structure of white male privilege, and – "

"- I've got to say, I'm not feeling my white male privilege today," Eric interrupts. He wonders if he used to do this when she stayed at home – vent everything in one long stream, as though his work problems were bigger than her domestic struggles, before he ever bothered to ask about _her_ day.

"Is something eating you, sweetheart?" she asks.

"I ran into Coach Erwin. _Literally_."

"Uh oh," Tami says. "That doesn't sound good."

"May I be excused?" Gracie asks.

"Clear your plate," Tami tells her. The plate clutters in the sink and Gracie disappears to the living room. The T.V. goes on. "We've got to limit her T.V. viewing."

Easy for her to say. She doesn't have to entertain the kid all day. "You mean _I've_ got to, I suppose?" Eric asks. "Since I'm home?"

"What happened with Coach Erwin?"

Eric tells her.

She sighs. "I guess our insurance rates are going up. That's the last thing we need right now. Between the mortgage and the payment on your truck - "

"- I didn't need a house this fancy, you know."

"Well I thought we'd have two incomes," Tami replies.

Eric grits his teeth.

"I'm sorry, hon," she says in a conciliatory voice. She puts one hand over his balled fist that is resting by the side of his plate and squeezes. "I didn't mean that as a slap. We're going to get through this."

"I told you one of us could lose our jobs. I told you we should buy a cheaper house."

She takes her hand away. "And I told you that you didn't need a truck that _big_."

"I thought I'd be hauling a lot of football equipment. Since the school didn't have money to rent more than one bus. Of course, now I know _why_ we didn't have the money!"

Tami stands and clears her plate. She comes over behind his chair and rubs his shoulders. His eyelids drop instinctively and he sinks into the pleasure of her touch. "We aren't going to fight about this," she tells him. "We're going to _talk_ about it, like two grown adults capable of dealing with a curve ball when it gets thrown our way." She stops rubbing, bends, and kisses the top of his head before sitting down across from him at the table. "Open the wine."

[*]

They agree that Eric will be a stay-at-home dad for the entirety of the next school year, until he can get a job in Franklin ISD the following school year. He's pretty sure Franklin High will hire him on as a full-time teacher and quarterback coach when contracts are up for renewal. They've implied as much. "And I should be promoted to head coach when Coach McKinley retires in three years."

"Well, it's a setback," Tami admits, "and I know it's not quite the team you want…but you'll be doing what you love again soon."

He draws his wine glass closer. "So you don't mind me being a kept man?"

"Eric," she says tersely. "All those years I stayed at home, did you respect what I did, or did you think I was just a lush feeding off of you?"

"You _know_ I respected what you did. But this is different."

"How so?"

"Because….I'm the _man_."

She sighs. Tami knows stepping away from the glory of the Panthers to head a losing team in Pemberton, getting Eric to put her career first and finding himself making less money than her, was a slap to his dignity to begin with, but now _this_ – the _complete_ loss of his job. She understands how his brain and pride work, and she'd be lying if she said she didn't find his masculine impulse to provide attractive in its own way, but sometimes she thinks he needs to get with the times. "You're the man who's provided single-handedly for this family for fifteen years and jointly for thirteen. And now it's my turn. For _one_ year. I think I can manage it. And you staying at home – it's going to be a help. We'll save on child care. It'll be great for Gracie to have this opportunity with you. It'll make my job a hell of a lot easier if I don't have to do two-thirds of the housework and household management anymore."

That last part's a bit of a jibe, because things should have been fifty-fifty, with them both working full-time, but they never have been – not when she was a principal, not when she was a counselor, and not now. But they _better_ be at least 75-25 if he's staying home.

"If I'm doing most of the housework," Eric warns her, "then I'm doing it my way. I don't want hear anything about the Cookie Crisp in the morning."

"You got her _Cookie Crisp_?"

He holds up a finger. "I don't want to hear it."

She chuckles, shakes her head, and draws her wine glass to herself. "Well, don't make it a habit." She sips.

Soon, they've got out a laptop and a spreadsheet and a notepad, and they're figuring out how they can spend less this year. "I guess I can get rid of that once a month maid service," Tami says. "If you stay on top of things."

"You were paying $150 _a month_ for that?" he asks.

"That's a _steal_ , babe."

Maid service is moved to the cut column.

"We could cut the cable," she suggests, "and just stream from Netflix and - "

"How am I going to get the games?"

"Of course," she mutters. "Silly suggestion. What do _you_ suggest?"

He looks over the budget. "I could sell my rifle and just keep the shotgun for home defense. I never go hunting anymore anyway." He's never had anyone _ask_ him to go hunting here, and it's not like it's his favorite pastime in the world, anyway.

"How much do you think you can get for that?"

"$400, maybe?" he speculates.

"Might as well keep it."

"I'll sell it. And I'll sell the golf clubs." No one asks him to go golfing here, either. He really only bought them to golf with Buddy. It was a stupid investment. He doesn't even _like_ to golf. "And I guess could…I could sell the truck. Buy something used and cheaper."

"No, don't do that, hon. It lost $10,000 in value when you drove it off the lot. And it's reliable. And under warranty for another two years. Might as well hold onto it."

He looks relived. "I guess I could forgo those season passes this year," he volunteers. "Just watch the Eagles on T.V."

Tami raises an eyebrow in surprise, but she doesn't look the gift horse in the mouth. "I think that's a good idea."

"You could cut back on the wine."

Now Tami doesn't like that idea _at all_. "But I'll cut back on the Thursday happy hours," she promises. "One drink only, keep it to forty minutes, then come home." She remembers how much she hated him going out with the guys when she was staying at home, even if he kind of had to for booster-related networking purposes. "Childcare was _going_ to be $6,000 between now and next June, so that's a savings." She types numbers into the savings spreadsheet she's made. She pulls up a file, finds out what he paid in income tax and FICA next year, and puts that under savings as well. "And let's say you'll save about $800 in gas not commuting and driving to the away games."

It takes an hour, but they get their budget drawn up, and then realize that, as day shows shift to evening, they've left Gracie unsupervised before a rather vulgar cartoon. "Maybe we _should_ cut the cable," Eric mutters.


	4. Chapter 4

When Tami comes out the master bath and into the bedroom that night, she's wearing a sexy red negligee she almost forgot she owned. She's not exactly in the mood after a long and frustrating day at work, but she figures her choice to seduce her husband will give his recently deflated ego a much-needed boost, and it will relieve some of the stress this job loss has put him under.

Eric doesn't require much seducing. He's setting his watch on the nightstand when she walks out, and when he looks up a boyish, excited laugh escapes his lips. It reminds her of their younger days, before two pregnancies, before half a dozen jobs, before they shipped a child away to college, before all the ups and downs and tears and laughter that grew them up and built their marriage. He's adorable with that laugh and that happy look in his eyes, and just a little bit sexy when he jerks his head and says, in that Texas draw she loves, "C'mere, babe."

It doesn't take long for her to _get_ in the mood.

[*]

Eric's still rubbing his eyes when he pulls the coffee pot out and fills his cup. Tami is finishing up a bowl of grits and looking through an open file, while Gracie is looking despondently into her own bowl of grits.

Tami stands, clears her bowl to the sink, and starts to wash it, but stops suddenly. "That's your job now." She leaves it half full of water in the sink before kissing him on the cheek and asking, "Can you drop off my cocktail dress at the dry cleaners? The black one that's hanging in the closet. I'm going to have to schmooze next Friday."

"Do I have to go to that?" He _hates_ college cocktail parties.

"Not if you don't want to. Morty can be my date."

Morty is an English professor that Tami befriended early in their move, and about whom she talked enough to make Eric a little jealous – until he met the man at one of those excruciating cocktail parties and realized Morty was as queer as a football bat. He almost declares he's not going then, but pauses. "Do _you_ want me to go?" After all, when _she_ was the stay-at-home mom, he expected her at his side at every one of the booster club events and football parties.

"I don't really need you, too, hon. I know how much you hate those things. No reason to make yourself miserable." She kisses him on the cheek again, kisses Gracie on top of the head, snatches up her briefcase, and heads for the door.

Eric leans back against the counter and thinks about her words. "I don't really _need_ you to." When she was his at-home wife and full-time support, he felt like he _needed_ her. He wonders if she'll lose respect for him over this next school year.

Gracie looks at the recently closed kitchen door and turns to her father. She pushes her largely untouched bowl of grits away. "Mommy's gone. Can I have the Cookie Crisp now?"

[*]

"One hour, Gracie Belle," Eric insists firmly. "And then the TV goes off."

Eric tunes out Dora the Explorer as best he can while he sits in his recliner, laptop open, and touches up his resume. He'll wait for the contracts to come for renewal in the spring, and then send it out to Franklin High and one other back up high school. When he's done changing a few words, he hops on Facebook to see how his boys are doing.

Eric never posts anything on Facebook himself; he just uses it to check in on the young men he once coached. His players at Pemberton told him that Facebook is "mostly for old farts now," but the Lions and Panthers he coached must be the last and youngest members of the old fart generation, because about two dozen of them have sent him friend requests since the move.

His profile picture – the only photo he has in his album - is one of him receiving the State Championship ring when he was head coach of the Lions. He's got his high school listed on there, and his college, and – he realizes now – his profession as head coach of the Pemberton Pioneers. Seeing it is like a slap in the face. He needs to delete that, but he's not sure how. Tami set up his profile for him when they moved.

He pokes around clicking on links until he finally figures out how to edit his job title. He deletes Head Coach, Pemberton Pioneers and then wonders what he should replace it with. Cookie Crisp Dispenser? Frozen Lasagna Chef? Dry Cleaner Liaison? "What does Daddy do these days?" he asks Gracie.

"Watches old football videos."

"What else?"

"Loves me!"

"That I do," he says with an affectionate smile. "What else do I do?"

" _Talks_ about football."

Finally, he types _Athletic Consultant_ and clicks save.

Then he returns to his news feed. Matt has posted a photo of his latest completed art work. $400, if anyone is interested. Eric's not even sure what it _is_. It doesn't look like anything. There's just lot of shapes floating around on a canvas. Matt can draw people like photographs. Why doesn't he do more of that? Who the hell is going to pay $400 for some shapes floating in space. Eric clicks like and scrolls on.

Julie has posted a photo of last night's dinner at some nice restaurant. What the heck is she doing going to nice restaurants on her shoe string budget, anyway? That looks like a place Eric might take Tami for their anniversary. If that's how she's spending what little money she has, she's going to be in debt up to her eyeballs by the time she finally gets the college degree. She better not come begging to them for money. Eric makes a note to tell Tami to talk to Julie about her financial choices. He clicks like and scrolls on.

Buddy has posted a photograph of himself with the Panthers at a summer barbecue, with the words – Bound for State next season! This new quarterback is one to watch. He's put on even more weight, and he's looking six years older since he last saw him instead of two. But one thing never changes about Buddy – the Panthers are his life. The thought makes Eric strangely sad. He clicks like and scrolls on.

Jess Merriweather has posted a photo of her hand boasting a solitaire engagement ring. Eric blinks. That girl's barely 20. He still thinks of her as a senior in high school. He reads enough of the comments to figure out she's gotten engaged to her fellow assistant coach at Dallas Walker High. When she finishes her degree at UT-Dallas in two years, they're getting married. Eric nosily click's through her fiancé's profile to discover he's a twenty-three-year-old redhead named Jake who played football for the Texas Mean Green at UNT, and he currently teaches American History at Dallas Walker High, along with serving as an assistant coach for the football team. Eric decides he's probably okay, and goes back to type "Congratulations" on Jess's status. He wonders if he'll be invited to the wedding.

He scrolls on. A high school girlfriend who dumped him at the end of 9th grade is complaining noxiously about her third husband, and all of her female friends are rallying to her defense. Eric really dodged a bullet with that one, he thinks, and feels a sudden surge of gratitude for Tami.

Below her rant is Landry Clarke's comment that he's transferring to an accelerated, combined program that will allow him to both finish his B.A. and get his J.D. in the next three years. Some girl named Cindy has written – _so proud of my Landy Pandy_ in the comments. Eric would kill Tami if she ever called him something like that in public. He clicks like.

Tim Riggins hasn't posted anything in weeks. He just has a lot of girls writing Happy Birthday on his wall, some along with risqué photos of themselves.

Luke Cafferty is home from his tour of duty and staying on his parents' farm for the time being.

Vince says summer training at Georgia State is "kicking his ass."

When he's done with all his scrolling and liking and reading, he realizes he's let Gracie watch more than an hour of TV, and now that annoying Caillou show is on. He slams his screen down. "Rush hour's probably over now. Let's take mommy's dress to the dry cleaners and go to the park."


	5. Chapter 5

When Eric drops Tami's dress at the drycleaners, he gets the weirdest look. "No suits for sir?" the woman behind the counter asks.

"No," he says. He points to the dress. "It's my wife's." Just in case this lady thinks he's crossdressing or something.

"What time?"

"Excuse me?"

"What time you need it?"

"Uh…tomorrow?" Eric has two suits total, mostly for church but also for formal football functions, and Tami usually takes them in for cleaning. He's not used to this procedure.

"Okay," the lady says. "Tomorrow."

Eric nods, takes Gracie's hand and leads her back outside.

"It's hot in there," Gracie says.

"Well, it's a dry cleaner." It's hot outside, too. He wouldn't think so if he was still in Texas, but after almost two years here, he's starting to adjust to Pennsylvania hot.

"Can we get ice cream?"

"Gracie, honey, it's ten a.m. And you had Cookie Crisp for breakfast."

Gracie pouts. "But it's _hot_!"

"No." He opens the back door of his truck for her, puts his hands under her arms, and lifts her up, because she can't even climb up with the running boards. Maybe Tami was right. Maybe this truck was a little too big. Not for what he wanted it for at the time, but for playing Mr. Mom…it's too big. He has to stand on the running board himself to make sure she's buckled in.

"Too tight!" she squeals, and he loosens the straps.

"When do you get to get out of this thing?" he asks. He remembers rolling around in the back of the station wagon at her age.

"Mommy says eight."

His cell phone rings as he's driving to the park, and despite the law about not using cell phones while driving, he answers it. Maybe he shouldn't have, because it's his insurance agent, and by the time he's done with the conversation, he's _steamed_. That asshole coach who lost him his job is claiming $1,500 in repairs for what amounts to a scratch. Insurance will take care of it, but his agent has blatantly warned him his rate is going up $500 a year next year. That's the _last_ thing they need, when he's not making one red cent.

When they get to the park, Gracie tears toward the playground equipment with abandon. Eric trails her more cautiously. There's a gaggle of stay-at-home moms laughing and talking under the picnic pavilion. None of them are paying any attention at all to their kids, who roam wild across the playground. Two are flinging sand at each other in the sandbox. Two more are fighting with sticks they've found on the ground. One is climbing up a slide while a sixth tries to go down it. And a seventh is hanging from the high monkey bars, straight down, and saying, "Mommy, help. Help, mommy! Mommy, help!" over and over.

Eric gets up under the boy and helps him down. The kid looks at him with alarm and runs off, at about which time the kid's mother sees fit to observe the scene. She comes over and stands next to Eric and looks him over. Maybe he shouldn't have touched another woman's kid. All those trainings about pedophiles and watching out for child groomers they made him go through in his school career have put him on edge. He tenses and prepares for her suspicion.

"Thanks," she says.

"Welcome," he mutters.

"Although I figure if I just let him fall, he'll get used to falling and stop calling for me."

She's probably right about that, Eric has to admit. But he finds it hard to ignore a crying child. A whining _teenager_ , on the other hand, he's happy to make do dozens of up-downs.

She takes off her sunglasses to reveal a pair of olive eyes. "I'm Katrina." She holds out her hand.

"Eric Taylor." He shakes.

Gracie is now at the top of the slide, sitting next to the kid who can't go down because the other kid is climbing up. "Move!" she orders the other kid. "You can't climb the slide!" The other kid stops climbing, rolls over onto his back, and slides down. Gracie slides down after him.

"So do you have the day off from work?" Katrina asks him. "Giving your wife a break?"

"Uh…yeah," he lies, because he doesn't want to admit he doesn't have a job.

"What do you do for a living?"

"Uh…"

"Daddy!" Gracie yells as she runs across the mulch. "Get me started on the swing!"

Eric's relieved by the interruption. He nods to the woman. "Nice talking to you" – and follows Gracie to the swing.

But pretty soon the woman's son is following and trying to scramble up on the swing next to Gracie, and Katrina is there and lifting the boy up.

Eric pushes three times before Gracie begins to pump. Eric glances at the boy, who just keeps holding his legs straight out as his mother pushes.

"This is Edward," the woman says, pointing to her son.

Who the hell names a pre-school age kid _Edward_?

"Gracie." Eric nods to his daughter.

"Daddy, one more BIG push!" Gracie cries, and Eric complies.

"So what do you do for a living?" the woman asks again.

"Uh…" He thinks of what he put on his Facebook profile to replace his lost job. "Athletic Consulting."

"Oh, yeah? What's that entail?"

Eric scratches his ear. "You know. Just…uh…advice. I've had a twenty-four-year career teaching and coaching. Been a college player, high school quarterback coach, head coach, college assistant coach… Won two Texas state football championships. I've also worked as an Athletic Director. So…I…uh…have a lot of advice."

"Oh, wow. Well, hey, my brother-in-law started a private school a few years ago, and they've been thinking about offering a football program, but he's not sure about all the red tape and regulations. I bet they could use your help. Do you have a business card?"

"Uh…" Eric pats his back pockets. "You know, I think I left them at home."

Katrina gives her son another push and then pulls out her cell phone. Well, what's your phone number? I'll just put it in my contacts."

How the hell does he get out of _this_? He suppose he could just not return the brother-in-law's call if he does call. He gives Katrina his number, and she slides the phone back in her pocket and pushes her son again.

"I hope you don't charge an arm and a leg, though," Katrina says. "The last consultant my husband tried to hire for _his_ business wanted $150 an hour. I doubt my brother-in-law is willing to pay that. Would you be willing to do it for $90?"

"Uh…" _$90 an hour? $90? AN HOUR?_ Even when he was at the _height_ of his career, that brief stint coaching college ball, he never made more than $45 an hour on paper, and if you counted all the off-the-books hours he put in, probably never more than $30.

"I mean, it's a private school," she says. "A non-profit. And twenty percent of the students are on full scholarship. It's a great school. Maybe you'd be willing to lower your rate for them to just $90?"

"Yeah," he says. "Maybe I'd consider that."

[*]

Maybe he can do this, Eric thinks as he drives home. He's run athletic programs before, as Athletic Director at Dillon. He basically ran the football program at Dillon, even when he wasn't athletic director. He knows all about the regulations and red tape. He built that team at East Dillon from nothing. Sure, he doesn't know everything involved with the administrative side of things, but he knows people who _do_ know. He has scores of contacts in his phone – coaches, athletic directors, boosters, school principals, equipment suppliers, referees, regulators…what he doesn't know, he can find out.

[*]

Gracie wants frozen pizza for lunch, but Eric tells her she needs something healthier and makes her grilled cheese and tomato soup instead.

"It's the same as pizza," she says. "Cheese. Bread. Tomato."

"Just eat your lunch."

When his cell phone rings, he lunges for it, hoping it's Katrina's brother-in-law. He leaves the room so he can talk.

It's not. It's a kid he coached in junior high, when they lived in Midland: Colton Wilks. Except the kid isn't a kid anymore. He's over thirty now. Other than liking the kid's posts on Facebook, and running into him at the Panther's State Championship a few years ago, Eric hasn't spoken to him in years.

"Hey, Colt," Eric says. "What can I do you for, son?"

Colton laughs. "You know I'm not young enough to be your son. You were twenty-three when you were an assistant coach for the Mountaineers. And I was twelve."

It seemed like a huge age difference then, but Eric supposes he's right. It's not now. In fact, sometimes Eric still imagines he's thirty, until something aches that never ached before, or until he realizes he has an engaged daughter who's living with an artist in Chicago. "Habit," Eric tells him.

"Well, listen, I'm calling because when I was on Facebook today, I saw you updated your profile. You're doing Athletic Consulting now?"

"Uh…Yeah."

"Because I could really use your help. I'm a counselor now at Sam Houston High, and I'm helping these kids as best as I can, but some of these football players could really use some more informed help navigating the college recruiting maze, if you know what I mean. Some of them are getting screwed, and some are running afoul of the rules without realizing it. The coach here is sort of uninterested in that side of things, and a bit new to coaching, and he isn't really helping them. Parents want someone else they can call, someone experienced, who's coached lots of high school kids on into college ball, you know? Someone who's also been a coach at the college level and who will tell it to them like it is."

"Oh, uh…huh."

"But they don't necessarily have a lot of money for athletic consulting, so I was wondering, you know…I talked to some of the parents. There's four or five, maybe six, who are interested. They were wondering if you'd maybe be willing to do it for $50 an hour? I know that's not much for your line of work and your level of expertise, and it's a real long shot asking for that rate, but I promised them I'd try. Would you be interested?"

[*]

"Frozen lasagna yesterday and frozen pizza today?" Tami asks, looking at the pizza in the center of the table.

"Sorry, babe, I got kind of busy and distracted."

She looks around the kitchen, which does not appear to have been mopped or scrubbed. As far as she can tell, the only thing he did today was drop off her dry cleaning, feed and clothe Gracie, and make a frozen pizza. "Really? Busy doing _what_ exactly?"

"Staring my own consulting business."

Tami raises an eyebrow. She scoops up her wine glass, takes a sip, leans back in her chair, and says, "Do tell."


	6. Chapter 6

That night, after Gracie is bathed and in P.J.s and in her bed looking at books, waiting to be officially tucked in before lights out in forty minutes, Tami helps Eric set up a account to receive payments. "This will be quicker than checks," she tells him.

"But I've got to pay a fee?"

"It's worth it for the convenience, trust me. And you'll get paid faster. And people will want to use credit cards. So you consulted with three parents today?"

He nods.

"And how are you keeping track of your hours?"

Eric taps his forehead.

"Eric! You've got to log them in a spreadsheet." She sighs and pulls up Excel. "Let's set something up temporarily for each client. You can do the invoices in Word for now. I think I still have my template back from when I was tutoring junior high kids ten years ago. But we're going to need to get you some modern invoicing and tracking software. Which you're going to need to put down as an _expense_. Don't forget to record your _expenses_."

"I don't think I'll _have_ any expenses. I just talk to people on the phone. E-mail people."

"So you pro-rate your cell phone bill," Tami tells him. "Pro-rate the Internet bill. You'll probably end up meeting people for lunch to talk shop. Keep those receipts. And record the mileage to and from any meetings. Paper and ink for invoices. Now, you'll do it as a sole proprietor and just use your own social security number and file it as self-employment income, but we need to find out if you need a business license in Pennsylvania."

Eric laughs and shakes his head. "Thank God I've got you."

"Well, I did all this when I was tutoring. But this is a lot more complicated than tutoring. Well…it's a lot more _money_ anyway." She peers at him. "Did you say $50 an _hour_?"

"That's my _heavily discounted_ rate, babe."

She laughs. "Well, who knows, if you like this, and you do well….maybe you don't have to go back to coaching at all. Maybe you just work 15, 20 hours a week and still have plenty of time to take care of Gracie. Maybe you work part-time until she's done with high school."

"Well, let's not go _that_ far."

Tami smiles. She's glad he's stumbled into this opportunity. She would never admit it to him, but she's relieved to know they'll have some extra money. For decades, they lived on only one income, and they got by just fine. But somehow, over the past five years, with both of them working full-time, they gradually expanded to fit their means – and the Phili metro area is a lot more expensive than Dillon was.

There's another reasons she's relieved – Tami's not sure how Eric's ego would survive a full year of not contributing to the household income. Her mother warned her about the masculine ego when she got married, and Tami just laughed the woman off. Her mother was old-fashioned and outdated and didn't understand the modern world Tami was inhabiting. But over the years, Tami gradually began to realize that her mother was seventy-five percent correct. "I'm proud of you, babe." Tami wraps her arms around his neck. "People are recognizing your expertise."

He smiles, leans in for a kiss, and murmurs against her lips, "I do have a lot of _expertise_ , don't I?"

She chuckles and lets him kiss her a few more times before she pulls away. "We need to finish this spreadsheet and get Gracie to bed."

"In a hurry to get her to bed are you? So you can utilize my _expertise_?"

"Yes. Your expertise in pouring me a glass of wine and massaging the feet I've been on all day long."

Eric sighs.

[*]

Eric wiggles Tami's little toe, which is on his lap as she stretches out across the couch drinking her wine. "This little piggie went to market."

"Don't you dare attempt to tickle me," she warns him. "I have wine in my hand."

"Fine." He resumes his massage of her feet. "You're looking beautiful this evening."

"Sex is not in the cards tonight."

"It was _just_ a compliment."

She sips her Chardonnay. "I know your compliments are paving blocks, hon." She closes her eyes and leans back and savors the massage, until his hand slip from her foot and she opens her eyes to find him staring off in to space. "You all right, sweetheart?"

"I don't know what the hell I'm doing," he says. "These kids' parents think I know. I don't know."

"You _do_ know," she assures him. "You _know_ football. You know recruiters and several college coaches. And you know a Dead of Admissions. Intimately."

"Apparently not as intimately as I'd like," he quips. "At least not tonight."

She laughs and shakes her head. "Eric, you can do this. I know you. You _will_ rise to the occasion. And they'll be glad they hired you."

He slides a hand up her leg and crawls slightly over her. "You always were the best cheerleader."

"I was the worst. I almost got cut from the squad."

He kisses her. "Ain't the kind of cheerleader I mean." He kisses her again, and snakes his hand under her skirt.

She claps her legs together to trap it. "Eric."

He grumbles, but he slides his hand back down and out, sits back in his spot, and resumes massaging her foot.

[*]

The next day, Eric becomes one of those unobservant parents at the park. He's not gossiping with the moms, but he's pacing beyond the wooden beams that outline the playground, talking on his cell phone. He's putting in calls to coaches and administrators, and his buddy over on the administrative side of the NCAA to make sure he has all the right information before answering some questions a parent has on behalf of her soon-to-be college player."

"Push me, Daddy! Push me!" Gracie cries, and he does, with one hand, while he talks.

Tonight, he makes a dinner from scratch – his famous chili – but he forgets to pick up Tami's dry cleaning.

She grumbles about it over dinner. "That was the one thing I needed you to do today."

" _One_ thing? I've watched Gracie all day. There's like a hundred things she needs me to do. And I did a load of laundry. And I cleaned the kitchen. And I cooked dinner. Do you have any idea how many little details go into - " He stops suddenly, in the glare of her gaze. "Yes," he says. "Yes, I suppose you do know how many little details go into a day at home." He sips his ice tea and sets it down. "I'll run out and get the dry cleaning after I make a call to this parent."

"They close at eight and it's fifteen minutes away."

"I'll run out right after dinner. Then I'll make the call."

"Good," she says.

"How was your day?" Eric asks, and listens to the latest Braemore drama before launching into his day.

"And did you hear from that man who wants to start a football department at the private school."

"Not yet, but I'll try to talk to Katrina about it at the playground tomorrow. She'll probably be there. I think she's there every day."

" _Katrina_?" Tami asks. "Who's _Katrina_?"

"The woman I told you about. The one who's brother-in-law started that school."

"Oh." She leans her spoon against the edge of her bowl and plucks up her ice tea. "I didn't think about you hanging out with those ladies in the park every day. I bet they _love_ you. Handsome stay-at-home dad." She sips.

He _did_ think maybe one of them was flirting with him today, when he finally got off the phone, and she came and plopped her daughter down in the swing next to Gracie. "You worried?" he asks.

Tami chuckles. "Not for a second. I've seen you flirt."

"Contrary to popular belief, I'm very charming with the womenfolk."

"You're also very married."

"Very," he agrees. "Very, very married, and, besides, those ladies…" He moves his hand like a mouth. "Talk _way_ too much."

"You should come to the cocktail party with me Friday night after all. I'll see if I can get Gracie a sleepover at Pujitha's."

"Yay!" Gracie exclaims.

Pujitha is a little girl who lives three doors down, and a regular playmate of Gracie's, but she's in day camp all summer long, except weekends.

"It might be a good chance for you to network," Tami tells him. "I mean…Braemore _does_ have an athletic department. And some of the spouses of some of the professors are involved in athletics. Surely someone there needs a consultant."

Eric knows she's right, but he hates cocktail parties with a passion. He thought he'd gotten out of this one. "I don't know."

"And you sure would look good around my arm. I've only gotten to show you off three times in two years."

"How long are we going to stay?"

"I promise, no more than two hours. And then we can come back to a nice, empty house." She winks at him.

He grins and looks down into his chili, glances at Gracie, who is oblivious to the implication, and then says, "A'ight. I'll be your date."


	7. Chapter 7

Gracie is at the top of the slide, looking with disdain at the child crawling up it toward her – Katrina's boy. Eric knows that look in Gracie's eyes well – he's seen it on Tami's face many times. But Tami also has a smile that breaks out and transforms the disdain into sheer southern sweetness, and then she has that tone where it's not quite clear to strangers whether she's insulting them or complimenting them. Gracie doesn't have any of that. She's a bull in a china shop, as direct as a master archer's arrow: "Get. Off. The. Slide. Can't you see I'm coming down?"

"Edward now, let Gracie come down," Katrina says. Edward obeys his mother, turning around halfway up the slide, but then inching down ever so slowly, his legs spread wide and his feet against the edges. Gracie heaves herself down, her shoes landing on the boy's shoulders and pushing him the rest of the way to the ground.

"Gracie, don't do that again," Eric says halfheartedly. The truth is that little Edward prick deserved a good smash down the slide. But he doesn't want any hard feelings with Edward's mother because…"Hey, Katrina," he says as the kids now rush off to another piece of equipment. He leans his arm against the bars that surround the stand at the top of the slide. "Your brother-in-law….does he still need advice about getting that football program started? I haven't heard from him."

The gaggle of stay-at-home moms isn't at the park today. They apparently all signed up for "Mommy and Me" music classes, but Katrina missed the deadline. Eric figures this is a good chance to "network" as Tami calls it.

Katrina looks him over – at least, he feels like he's being looked over. "Why don't we go out to lunch and discuss it when the kids are done playing."

"Uh…"

"Take them to McDonald's."

Eric's muscles tense instinctively. He's not quite sure what to make of this suggestion. He can't remember the last time he went to lunch with a woman that wasn't Tami. In his line of work, he usually ends up at sports bars with men. It's never really been necessary to lunch alone with a woman, so he hasn't had to worry about appearances. But it's not as if they'll be completely alone. The _kids_ will be there. Still, he feels weird about it for some reason. Maybe because he's aware that Katrina _is_ attractive – or, at least that most men would find her figure attractive. Not that he does. Well, _objectively speaking_ maybe he does. If he wasn't married and she wasn't married…God, he can't even _imagine_ not being married. He's not sure what he would do if he wasn't married. But he's pretty sure he wouldn't be micro-analyzing the potential implications of a lunch at McDonald's. "Sure."

[*]

Edward and Gracie have disappeared up inside the indoor, plastic play structure at the back of the McDonald's, and left the adults – and a tsunami of paper wrappers - at the table. Katrina is talking. And talking. About…well, Eric's not quite listening. But he tunes back in when she says, "Do you have that problem with Gracie?"

"Uh…sometimes, yeah."

"So what's your solution? You seem like a really capable dad." She smiles.

He's not sure about that smile. He's getting the vague impression that Katrina _might_ be flirting with him. He's not really sure what that looks like these days. _He_ hasn't been flirting, but some women don't need much encouragement. He remembers that much from college. And he's also found that by simply acting reflexively like a _Texan_ in Pennsylvania, he attracts a lot of female smiles. Or female rage. There was that one woman who sneered at him for opening the door to the coffee shop for her and told him she was quite capable of opening doors herself, thank you very much. But mostly they smile. Sometimes, when he says, "Excuse me, ma'am …." (you dropped your credit card, is that your order, or whatever), they even giggle a little. He isn't trying to flirt. He's just being…normal.

"I usually let my wife handle that stuff." he says finally. "Tami's great with that stuff." There. Kill two birds with one stone. Vaguely answer her question and remind her he's married.

Katrina laughs. "You weren't listening to a word I said, were you? You just want to know if my brother will give you business?" He opens his mouth, scrambling to think of a response that will appease her, but thankfully she carries on. "I'll call him today and see why he hasn't followed through, and I'll let you know. How's that sound?"

Eric nods. "Thank you."

Gracie flies out of the bottom of the blue covered slide. "Edward is stuck," she announces when she walks over to the table. She pops one of the last two remaining fries into her mouth.

"Oh dear," Katrina says. She looks at Eric. "Would you come to his rescue? There's no way I'm climbing up at that thing."

[*]

It's breakfast for dinner tonight – pancakes, bacon, and scrambled eggs. "Hon, this is delicious," Tami tells Eric, "but eventually you're going to have to expand your repertoire." He's done pretty well with the Mr. Mom thing, but given that he's only working a few hours a week currently at his new business, she expects him to accomplish a bit more. Like maybe he could have vacuumed the living room today. It certainly could have used it.

"What do you mean?" he asks. "My repertoire is expansive, babe. _Expansive_."

Tami chuckles. "Chili. Brisket. Frozen lasagna. Frozen pizza. Hamburgers and hot dogs. And breakfast food. And not a vegetable in sight. Am I missing anything?"

"I can make spaghetti," he insists. "With a salad on the side. A _vegetable_ salad. And I make a mean Mac N' Cheese. Isn't that right, Gracie?"

"It's okay," Gracie replies, and Tami snorts at Eric's expression.

Forks and knives rustle and scrape as they resume eating. Gracie puts down her fork and picks up her last strip of bacon with her hands and pops it into her mouth. When she's done, she announces, "Daddy unstuck Edward from the rocket today. And he paid for Mrs. Moretti's lunch because Mrs. Moretti forgot her cash."

Tami blinks. She sets down her glass of orange juice and, elbows now on the table, laces her fingers together as she looks at Eric. " _Who_ is Mrs. Moretti, and _why_ can't she pay for her _own_ lunch?"

"That woman I told you about!" Eric says defensively. A little too defensively, in Tami's opinion. "The one with the brother-in-law who might need my advice with getting a football team going at that private school."

"Who _might_ need your advice? But he hasn't called?"

"Not yet, no."

"So you bought her lunch."

"I didn't _buy_ her lunch," Eric insists. "She didn't have cash on her. I _loaned_ her lunch."

"Oh," Tami says, catching his eyes with hers. "So she's going to pay you back? By taking _you_ out to lunch sometime?"

"Tami. It was _McDonald's_. We were getting the kids a bite to eat after the park to talk about why her brother-in-law hasn't called me yet."

Tami unlaces her fingers and slides her orange juice closer. "And why hasn't he?"

"I don't know. She says she's going to ask him."

"You had to take her out to lunch to find out that she's going to ask him why he hasn't called? You couldn't find that out when you were at the park?"

"I didn't _take_ her out to lunch," Eric insists testily.

"It _sounds_ like you took her out to lunch to me. You went to lunch with her and you paid for her. What? She didn't have a credit card?"

Gracie looks from her father to her mother. "Is Daddy in trouble?"

"No," Tami tells her. "Daddy is not in trouble. Daddy and Mommy are just having a conversation. Why don't you clear your plate and go watch your show? We'll be in the living room in a bit."

Gracie does as she's told, and when the T.V. goes on in the living room, the muffled sound drifting to the half closed-off kitchen, Eric says, "It _sounds_ like I'm in trouble. In fact, it sounds like you're a little jealous, Tami. It _sounds_ like maybe the green-eyed mo - "

"- Eric," she interrupts sternly, and he bites down on his bottom lip. He gets that annoyed look in his hazel eyes that she knows very well – the one he gets when he's angry because he's worried that maybe he's wrong about something. " _You're_ not in trouble. But this woman…she _sounds_ like trouble. And you can be adorably naïve at times. I think she's playing you, hon."

"Playing me? What's that even mean?"

"How do you even know she _has_ a brother-in-law?"

"What, do you think she's really a Nigerian princess?"

Tami chuckles. "I'm not saying she's working a long con, sweetheart, I'm just saying maybe…maybe she thinks you're a good-looking man and she was making conversation. And she doesn't really have work for you, but she's trying to get close to you."

"I thought you weren't worried about any of those park ladies because I can't flirt."

"Well, I wasn't," she admits. "Until you took one to lunch."

"I did not _take her out_ to lunch! And I have to network! Isn't that what _you_ told me? I have to network. I kept the receipts."

"Oh," Tami mutters, "you kept the receipts, that's good. You kept the receipts from your lunch out with Ms. MILF."

"It's Moretti. Not _Milf_."

Tami points across the table at him. "See, this is _exactly_ what I mean about you being naïve."

Eric throws up his hands. "What do you want me to say, Tami? Give me my script so I can say what you want, and we can stop arguing about a damn McDonald's lunch!"

"Oh, no, no. We don't play that way, Eric. We have a _conversation_."

" _You_ have a conversation and I try to figure out what the hell you're so upset about."

"I am not upset," she insists calmly. "Do I _sound_ upset?"

"You _seem_ upset."

"And you seem unnecessarily defensive," she points out. "When all I'm trying to do is have a conversation."

He shakes his head in disbelief.

"Is she pretty?" Tami asks.

"Pretty? What's that even mean?"

"Pretty, Eric. I think you know what pretty means."

"I guess."

Now Tami shakes her head. "You _guess_."

"Tami, I wasn't coming on to this woman. I – "

"- I'm sure you weren't. I'm a rational human being, Eric. I've been married to you for twenty-five years. I know you're not coming on to some random woman at the park."

"So what's the problem?" he asks in frustration.

"The problem is, I think _she's_ coming onto _you_ , and I don't want you to leave her with the mistaken impression that you're receptive to the possibility."

"She's _married_."

"So are you. But, hon, I guarantee you there are women who are not stopped by either fact." She looks him over. "And look at you. I can read you like a book. You're feeling guilty for some reason. Why?"

He shrugs. He pulls his juice glass toward himself and drains the last ounce of orange juice before setting it down. "Okay, I did sort of kind of get the impression maybe she was flirting with me."

"Aha!" Tami exclaims triumphantly. "Well, if _you_ got that impression, she must have been holding a billboard."

"I am not as oblivious as you think I am. I knew you were flirting with me our senior year of high school, didn't I?"

She pushes her plate aside. "I was not flirting with you, Eric. That was wishful thinking on your part."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure you were."

"I was with Mo."

"Well, I hear that doesn't stop some women." He smiles.

She chuckles. "Maybe I was flirting just a little _tiny_ bit. Possibly." Her tone grows serious. "Listen, please don't take that woman to lunch again."

"Well, hell, why didn't you just say that from the start, and I'd say okay, and we'd have been done with this?"

Tami sighs. "I don't know. But we resolved it pretty quickly, didn't we? We're pretty good at this marriage thing."

On the counter by the stove, his phone honks to indicate a text message. Eric goes to pick it up and sits back down as he reads the message.

"Anything important?" she asks.

He clicks the phone off and slides it into his pocket. "It was Katrina."

Tami's eyebrow shoots up.

He looks at her with a hint of self-satisfaction. "She said she talked to her brother-in-law, and he's going to call me later this evening. So he _does_ exist."

"Well, I'm glad to hear that." Tami stands and scoops up her plate. "I still think she's trying to get her talons in you, though, so watch out." She saunters over to the sink and sets the plate down inside it.

Eric comes up behind her, wraps his arms around her, and draws her back against himself before nuzzling her neck. "You must think I'm pretty sexy if women are trying to get their _talons_ in me."

She smiles and squirms away from his little nips on her flesh, turning in his arms to face him. "You aren't bad looking," she admits.

He leans in and kisses her, and she wraps her arms around his neck and responds playfully, teasing his tongue with hers. His mouth crushes down on hers. It feels like high school under the bleachers all over again. Their breath deepens as they kiss, and he slides a hand from her hip up toward her breast, but then his phone rings. "Shit," he mutters.

"It's probably your girlfriend's brother-in-law," Tami says. She slips away from him, giving one teasing stroke to the hard-on that is now pressing against the inside of his jeans. "You better answer it." She slaps him on the ass before she slips from the kitchen.

"Eric Taylor speaking," she can hear him answer as she disappears through the entry way and across the hall to join Gracie in the living room.


	8. Chapter 8

Tami screws the backing onto her earring and watches her husband in the vanity mirror as he straightens his red tie. God she loves him in a suit. It almost always turns her on. She's going to make him keep that suit on when they get home tonight, and only unbuckle and unzip as much as she has to in order to get what she needs.

"You ready, hon?" she asks as she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Mhmhm…" Eric checks his pockets.

"Remember, you're the designated driver tonight. You need to stay sober to network with these people." And to be able to perform to her satisfaction later. She can be slightly buzzed for that, though. She might even enjoy it a little bit more that way.

"I know. You've only told me five times already. Just like you told me three times to make sure I have cash for the babysitter."

"Do you?"

"I'll stop at the ATM on the way home."

She turns, takes him by the tie, and draws him close. "You look very handsome, sugar." She gives him a teasing kiss but steps back when he doesn't respond as fully as she expects. He looks nervous. She doesn't know if he's nervous about spending two hours at a cocktail party with academics or about having to network. "You'll do fine. Talk to the Athletic Director. He'll probably put in a thirty minute appearance at some point. He knows people who know people who might need a consultant."

"Could you be more vague?"

She pats his shoulder. "You'll do fine. And if nothing comes of it, you've got that school consulting gig through your girlfriend, right?" He _did_ get the call from Katrina's brother-in-law, and he'll now be advising that private school on setting up its football program. The project could last six months and earn him $450 a week. Tami can't say she's not relieved, though she only told Eric she's _proud._

"Don't call Katrina that," he grumbles. "It's not funny."

Tami turns and plucks her red purse – which matches her red cocktail dress – off the vanity. "It's a little bit funny."

[*]

Almost as soon as they enter the foyer of the fancy house that is the residence of the president of the University, Eric can feel the pretension hanging in the air like the heavy glass chandler above them.

The house has an open-plan that allows one to see the library and formal dining room on either side of the foyer. Several people in both rooms stop chatting and turn and glance their way. Half the men are wearing glasses that are too small for their faces. Why are they wearing such tiny glasses? Do they think it makes them look smarter? Can they even _see_ anything with those glasses? Eric supposes they can see his wife's tits, because that's what half of the men appear to be looking at. Not that he blames them. They're _glorious_ in that dress.

The academics look away quicker than half his assistant coaches used to, though, he'll give them that, and they go back to talking. Eric can already hear a cloud of words he doesn't understand drifting this way.

He exchanges greetings with the president, who he's met before, at the last cocktail party Tami dragged him to, but the president quickly disappears. Soon enough, Tami is introducing him to the Dean of Inclusivity, whatever the hell that is. "And this is my husband," she's saying, "Coach Eric Taylor."

Eric's jaw clenches instinctively. He's _not_ a coach. Not anymore. And sure enough, the Dean of Inclusivity asks, "Oh, really? And what do you coach?"

Tami has realized her mistake. Eric can see it on her face, the brief, sudden panic, which is swallowed almost instantaneously by her glistening southern smile. She puts a hand on Eric's arm before he's forced to answer and says, "He's a retired coach. He's had a two-decade career coaching football, from the high school to the college level. Eric's considered to be one of the greatest high school coaches in the history of Texas."

Well, she's laying it on a _little_ thick there. But Eric can't help but smile.

"He brought home two Texas state championships," Tami continues, "But now he's moved onto a career as an athletic consultant. Isn't that right, hon?"

"Mhmhm." Eric doesn't say much more because he's pretty sure the Dean of Inclusivity doesn't need an athletic consultant.

Tami extricates them from the foyer and leads him toward the library, where someone is talking about intersectionality. Eric has no idea what the hell intersectionality is. Can you make a living in the intersectionality field? He suspects not.

The second a tray passes him by, he sweeps up a drink. He's going to need it to get through this.

"Remember you're driving," Tami says in a whisper.

Now he wants the drink even more. He sucks down a sip and winces. He has no idea what's in it, but it tastes like maybe there's vermouth. He hates vermouth. But he suppose it will get the job done. He takes another sip before he realizes Tami has just introduced him to some professor. He chokes down the drink and says, "Eric Taylor," though he didn't catch the professor's name. The man is wearing tiny glasses _and_ a bowtie. A _striped_ bowtie. Eric extends his hand to shake.

"And where did you go to college, Mr. Taylor?" the professor asks.

"I'm an Aggie."

"Ah," the professor says with either feigned interest or thinly veiled disdain. "Hook 'em horns." He makes something that looks a hell of a lot more like bunny ears than horns.

"That's the Longhorn's slogan, actually, Howard," Tami tells him gently, like she's pretending she's not talking to an idiot. "That's UT-Austin. Aggies are Texas A&M."

Another man draws up beside Professor Howard Whoever, but he doesn't have on any pretentious glasses or a bowtie. He doesn't even have a tie. He's wearing only a white, button-down dress shirt beneath a blue blazer. And he's drinking something that looks a hell of a lot better than what Eric's drinking. In fact, it looks like _whiskey_.

"Well, A&M is no Braemore, but I supposes it's a passable school," Professor Howard Whoever says.

The man in the blue blazer replies, "It's more than _passable_ , Howard. It was ranked 69 among 311 national universities in the last issue of _U.S. News and World Report_. That's just ten places below Braemore, and for one-fourth the tuition. And Tami went there, too, so you might want to watch your word choice." He smiles at Tami, two dimples pocking his cheek and a set of straight teeth shinning out beneath his twinkling gray-blue eyes.

 _Who the hell is this guy?_ Eric wonders.

"I thought you'd gone to Dartmouth?" Professor Howard Whoever says.

"Nope," Tami replies. "Just _passable_ old A&M."

"But she was _accepted_ to Dartmouth," the man in the blue blazer says. "The price was, however, unfortunately out of reach. And I suppose she had other enticements to A&M." He raises his glass to Eric.

Why in the hell does this man know so much about Tami?

"Adrian," Tami says, "this is my husband Eric. Y'all haven't met yet."

"Professor Adrian Rodgers," the man says, extending his hand.

"Eric Taylor," Eric replies as he shakes, and, because he has nothing better to add - "Where'd you get the whiskey?"

"Come on." Professor Adrian Rodgers jerks his head beyond the library. "I'll show you. I'm sure Tami needs to circulate anyway."

Eric hands his unfinished cocktail over to Tami and beings to follow Professor Rodgers, wondering why Tami hasn't mentioned this man before. As he follows, Tami calls after him – "Remember, hon - you're driving!"


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N:** A couple of my novels are on sale in the Kindle versions this week. If you're interested, go to Amazon and search for "Molly Taggart." If you like this story, I think you'll like _The Caterer's Husband_ , _Incomplete Pass_ , and _Off Target_.

[*]

Professor Adrian Rodgers leads Eric through the house, out a back door, and onto a surprisingly uncrowded porch. A servant stands behind a small bar, and Professor Rodgers asks for a whiskey. As he hands it to Eric, he says, "Thanks for giving me an excuse to get out of there. I hate these cocktail parties, but it's practically mandatory to put in an appearance if you don't want to be passed over for tenure."

"You don't have tenure yet?"

"This is my third university. But I should have it here in a year."

Eric sips and looks around. "Quiet out here."

"Well, it's eighty degrees. No one wants to be in this heat."

Eric snorts. "I used to hold morning practices in ninety degrees."

"Morning practices?"

"I used to be a high school football coach," Eric explains.

"Ah. I played in high school."

Eric looks him over. He's broad-shouldered, but otherwise fairly lean. "Offensive back?" he guesses.

"Receiver."

"But now you're a professor of…."

"Economics."

Well, at least it's not _Intersectionality_.

Professor Rodgers walks a little way from the bar and sits down on a low stone wall. There's a couple talking to each other across the porch on the other side, by another wall, but otherwise it's just them. Eric sits down beside him and sets his whiskey glass on the wall to his right. Through the window to the house, he can see Tami now making the rounds in the living room. "How do you know my wife, Professor Rodgers?"

"Please, call me Adrian." He smiles indulgently, like maybe he thinks Eric is stupid. "We both work at Braemore. I thought that was obvious enough."

"Yeah, but…how do you know about her educational history?"

"It's come up in conversation."

Eric wants to know when, why, and where they were having this conversation, but he doesn't ask. Instead he asks, "Are you married?" He doesn't see a wedding ring.

"Not at the moment. And I'm not on the look out for the fourth Mrs. Rodgers, either."

 _Three_ divorces? Eric can't help but wonder if Adrian Rodgers is the kind of guy to ruin his marriages by sniffing around other men's wives. "The alimony must be something else."

Adrian scratches his cheek, which is lined by a thin, dark stubble. "None to my first wife. We married young – barely twenty - and parted before either of us had much of anything. You know those marriages never last."

"Mine did." Eric sips his whiskey slowly and sets it back on the wall.

"Ah, yes." Adrian smiles and sips from his glass. "Tami mentioned you met in high school. Exception that proves the rule, I suppose. My second marriage was good. It lasted ten years, but my wife died."

"Oh, I'm sorry." Eric feels an ass now.

"So am I. More sorry I rushed into the next one because I was lonely. She left me two years later and took the house, half my savings account, and half my retirement fund, but there's no alimony, thankfully. And now I need another whiskey." Adrian drains the last sip in his glass and comes back with two more. He sets one down next to Eric, who looks at it warily. "Yeah, I heard Tami, you're driving. But you know you aren't going to be able to pull her out of here for another three hours, so, might as well drink now and dry out later." He raises his glass.

Eric toasts Adrian's glass and shoots back the last of the whiskey in his glass before setting it down on the wall and plucking up the other one. "I have to go back in there at some point, though."

"She _is_ looking this way."

Eric turns to look through the window and sees Tami watching him and jerking her head in the direction of some man he guesses is probably the Athletic Director she wants him to network with. He slides off the wall and raises his glass. "Nice meeting you, Adrian."

"You, too, Eric."

Eric nods and makes his way in the house, where Tami introduces him to the Athletic Director. Eric comes out of the conversation feeling like he probably has _not_ lined up anymore work for himself – unless he wants to apply to be an assistant to the assistant athletic director, which does not include any coaching duties. "I don't think I'll be putting in an application for that," he tells the Athletic Director. "My consulting business is taking off." It's not, precisely, _taking_ off. He has a handful of clients that equate to about 15 hours a week of work. But it's better than saying, "I'd rather stay home with my kid and let my wife support me than push papers around a Braemore desk."

The conversation with the Athletic Director shifts to college football, but he's really more of a baseball man, and soon he's extracting himself from the corner where Eric has loosely pinned him. Which means Eric is stuck at this cocktail party for another two hours with no mission but to play Tami's armpiece.

He mostly nods and smiles as Tami talks to people and slowly nurses his second whiskey until it's gone before switching to water. He checks his watch four times and finally leans over and whispers, "I need to hit the head."

But after he does, he vanishes out to the quiet back porch again, where he figures he'll sit alone, drink just _one_ more whiskey, and read sports news on his phone. But he finds Adrian at the bar, who invites him to sit at one of the three circular tables with him that are situated in the garden. Eric accepts.

Adrian takes an ashtray from behind the bar and places it on the white tablecloth that drapes the folding table. When they settle into the stiff folding chairs, Adrian fishes a packet of cigarettes out of his blazer and extends them toward Eric. Marlboro.

"No thanks. I don't smoke."

"Mind if I do?"

Eric shakes his head, even though he _does_ mind. But he's mostly downwind.

Adrian lights up. "No luck with the Athletic Director?" he asks around his cigarette.

"What do you mean?"

"Trying to drum up business for your athletic consulting business, I presume? Tami told me about your new venture."

Eric's jaw clenches. "You talk an awful lot to my wife."

Adrian chuckles. "Don't worry. I already made a subtle pass and she already put me off abruptly, and in no uncertain terms."

Eric glares at him.

He blows out smoke. "What? Do you want to punch me for it? I didn't realize she was married. It was winter when I first met her. She had leather gloves on. I didn't see the ring. I'm one of the five professors on the admissions interview panel. So we sort of work together."

"She's never mentioned you."

"Who are the other four professors on the panel, do you know?" Adrian asks.

"No," Eric admits. Tami probably _has_ mentioned them, _and_ Professor Rodgers, and he was probably half tuning out. "Point taken."

Adrian flicks ash into brown, circular, plastic ash tray and takes another puff. "Did you teach high school? When you were coaching?"

Eric nods. "Most years I taught football for two periods. General P.E. for one. Health and nutrition for a fourth. And the rest were planning periods."

"But you never taught academics?"

"Not since I became a head football coach," Eric replies, "but before that…they'd plug me in where they needed me. I taught U.S. History one year. 7th grade math another, back when I was coaching middle school. Even taught a year of English, though my daughter Julie doesn't believe me when I tell her that."

Adrian chuckles. "Two kids? Big age gap?"

Eric tries not to be irritated again to discover he knows so much. "Yeah. Gracie starts kindergarten in the fall. A little early. She'll still be four." He puffs up proudly. "She's a smart one."

"Like her mother?"

"Yeah. Like _my wife_."

Adrian smirks slightly. "The reason I ask if you've ever taught is that I teach a Sports Economics class. It's a popular class, because it satisfies an elective requirement for three different majors – Economics, P.E., and Sports Management. Occasionally I have a guest speaker come in. I'm doing a unit on the economics of football. I thought maybe you'd like to talk to us about it."

"I don't know anything about economics. Tami balances the checkbook."

"Well, that's _finance_. Not economics. You probably know plenty about economics. You just don't know that you do. Economic reasoning can be applied to nearly every aspect of life, or be used to explain nearly every human choice."

"That seems like a cold way to think."

"That's what my third wife said. Before she made the rational economic choice to leave me." Adrian taps his cigarette on the ashtray.

"You wouldn't have to know any terminology. Just answer the student's questions about your own experience. I'll supply the terminology, a bit of commentary, and direct them to analyze whatever you say from an economic perspective. You don't even need to prepare any remarks. Just show up and be ready to answer questions."

"Uh….I don't know."

"Braemore has funds for guest experts. They'd pay you a hundred and fifty dollars. It'll take an hour and a half."

"Oh. Well maybe I could possibly - "

Adrian laughs and scoops up his whiskey glass. "See? Economics."

[*]

Tami's a little pissed, Eric can tell, because she's having to drive home. But he got to talking with Adrian, and one whiskey led to another, and well….

"You know, you were going to get laid extra hard tonight," she tells him as she puts on her turn signal and pulls his massive pick-up truck onto the entrance ramp to the highway.

"And now I'm not?"

"How much did you have to drink?" she asks.

"Not enough for whiskey dick, if that's what you're asking."

"Thanks, Eric. Thanks for a little crudeness to end the evening."

"It's what you were asking," he reasons.

"Well, now I'm not in the _mood_ anymore anyway."

Eric puts a hand on her knee, just below the hem of her short, red, cocktail dress, and starts to slide it up. "I could _get_ you in the mood."

She reaches down from the steering wheel and slaps his hand away.

"Or not." He rubs the back of his hand. "Ow. That was hard."

"You deserved it. I wanted more wine. You promised you'd drive. I _reminded_ you that you were driving. _Repeatedly_."

"Sorry. Tami, I'm sorry. I got to talking."

" _You_ got to talking?" She chuckles and shakes her head. "Well that is something." She turns and looks him over. "Just wear that suit again on Sunday to church. By then I won't be irritated with you anymore. And then take me out for a nice lunch after the service, and we can put a movie on for Gracie when we get home. Lock the bedroom door."

He grins. "Yes, ma'am."

"It's hard for me to be too mad when it looks like maybe you made a friend. God knows you need one. You don't talk to any of your old assistant coaches at Pemberton anymore, and you don't hang out with anyone from church. But it seems like you and Adrian really hit it off. You two should go to a game or something."

"I don't know if I _want_ to be friends with someone who made a pass at my wife. A pass she never _told_ me about."

"Oh, Good Lord, hon. If I told you about every pass every man made at me I'd be talking about passes all dinner long."

Eric blinks. "Wait. What. You _would_?"

She reaches down and pats his knee. "Don't worry about it, sugar."

Eric settles his head back against the headrest and feels it spin just a little bit. He closes his eyes, and when he wakes up, it's because they're home, the babysitter is already paid and gone, and Tami has returned to open his door and unbuckle his seatbelt. "Come on, babe. You can either get out and walk in yourself, or sleep here all night. Because I'm certainly not carrying you in."

He slides out of the truck and stumbles after her.


	10. Chapter 10

Sitting through church is painful because Eric knows what's going to happen _after_ church. And it doesn't help that Tami keeps resting her hand on his knee – well, not quite his knee – a little higher than his knee – or that the Old Testament reading is from Song of Solomon today –

 _How beautiful are your sandaled feet, princess!_  
 _The curves of your thighs are like jewelry,_ _  
 _the handiwork of a master._  
 _Your navel is a rounded bowl;_  
 _it never lacks mixed wine._  
 _Your waist is a mound of wheat_  
 _surrounded by lilies._  
 _Your breasts are like two fawns,_  
 _twins of a gazelle.__

Eric slowly glances at Tami, who catches his eyes with her own twinkling blue ones. Her red lips curve up into a smile.

It doesn't help that she's in her Sunday best either – she's sexier even than she is in her little black cocktail dress – even sexier than she is in her cut-off Daisy Duke southern girl short shorts - she's _classically_ beautiful today, like someone who's just stepped off a 1950s movie set.

He can't help but steal glances at her when they rise for the hymn or when they sit for the sermon.

"How long is this sermon gonna be?" he mutters.

"It _just_ started, babe."

There's still the prayer that always follows – and is always a little too long – the offering – a few more songs and – "Is it a communion Sunday?" he whispers. He can never keep track of when that is. It seems random to him. Not like in the Episcopal church he grew up in, when it was every Sunday without fail.

"Not this week," Tami whispers back.

"Praise Jesus!" he says a little louder than a whisper, and, from behind him, a woman says, "Amen!"

[*]

Eric kicks the door of the bedroom shut and Tami turns up the radio, in case the T.V. Gracie's watching isn't loud enough. Eric starts to strip off his jacket coat but Tami says, "Leave it on…" as she backs him up against the door and yanks his tie to drag his lips down to hers.

His hand shoots to the back of her dress where he fumbles for the zipper and pulls it down with a slow rasp to where it ends just above the curve of her ass. "Aw hell, Tami," he murmurs because she's wearing the lacy black bra she knows – she just _knows_ – drives him wild.

Tami sashays backward from his grip and begins to step out of her high heels.

"Nah, no," he breathes. "Leave 'em on."

Somehow, she manages to step out of her dress without losing the shoes, and now she's in nothing but panties and a bra.

"Aw hell, Tami."

She grabs him by the tip of the tie and reels him in, and this time when they kiss his hand goes straight to her left breast. His thumb slides over the silk fabric until her nipple hardens beneath his touch.

Eric's tie gets loosened before they make it to the bed, and his belt buckle is undone before he tosses her on the mattress – but other than having his pants and boxers stripped down to his knees – his suit doesn't come off the whole time. Tami, however, is stark naked by the time he's done with her.

They're both lying on their backs, side by side, half off the bed, feet on the floor, panting and laughing, when there's a knock on the door.

"Mom! Dad! Can you Pleaaaaaaaaase turn your music down! I can't hear my show! And I'm hungry! When are we leaving to eat?"

[*]

Tami and Eric are both in jeans and t-shirts when they go out for Sunday family brunch, forty minutes later than usual. They eat frozen pizza before the T.V. on Sundays during football season, but the rest of the year they're at Tami's favorite little grill – where she can get bottomless mimosas for $10. And she always gets her money's worth. And he always gets lucky when they go home. But he's _already_ gotten lucky this morning, so he's doubtful it's going to happen twice. Instead, Tami's probably going to talk his ear off when they get home.

Which she does….with her bare feet up on his lap, demanding a foot massage, while Gracie plays in the house across the street with the neighbor kids.

"So when are you teaching this class?" she asks.

"Wednesday. And I'm not _teaching_ it," Eric insists. "Adrian says I just have to answer their questions."

"Well you better have some opening remarks prepared."

He works his thumb down the middle of her foot. "He said I didn't have to."

" _Hon_."

"What? I'll wing it."

She pulls her foot out of his lap. "A college seminar is not something you _wing_."

"It'll be fine. I did it all the time when I was teaching history and I got too busy with game plans to make lesson plans."

"You put on videos," Tami says. "And that was a discredit to those students."

"Was it? Ken Burns does a hell of a lot better job teaching about the Civil War than most junior high teachers _I've_ met."

She swivels and leans against his side now, and he drops his arm down around her shoulders. "You may have a point there."

He kisses the top of his head. "A'ight, I admit, I'm a little nervous. Which is why I'm going to wing it. If I write something, I'll just be nervous the whole time I'm planning it, too."

"What are you going to do with your $150 appearance fee, Coach Taylor?"

"I'm gonna buy you fifteen bottomless mimosas this fall. See how many times I can get you bottomless."

She chuckles and reaches up to toy with his fingers. "No, you're not. You'll be home watching the games."

"Mhmmm….buy you some cheap champagne and orange juice. Make 'em at home while we watch the games."

"That sounds fun actually." She puts her feet up on the coffee table and snuggles in.

He leans his head back against the couch and closes his eyes. "Mhmhm…does, doesn't it?"

"You're not going to sleep, are you?"

"Why?" he asks. "You need me for something?"

"I don't know…Gracie's across the way…I thought maybe we might fool around."

His eyes pop straight open, and she laughs.

[*]

Eric's not expecting Adrian's Sports Economics class to consist of over 200 students. Most of them are clearly athletes, though there are a handful of both fat and scrawny economics majors and probably a number of students who are both athletes and economics majors. From surveying the auditorium, Eric can guess that maybe one-fourth of them are football players.

Adrian introduces him and then proceeds to sit on a table on the stage. Eric wonders if he's supposed to sit on it, too. That seems excessively casual to him. He wore a suit for this, but Adrian is in jeans and a button-down flannel shirt. Eric would be a hell of a lot more comfortable in jeans and a button-down flannel shirt if he'd known he could wear them.

He compromises on leaning back against the table, while still mostly standing, and points to the first hand that goes up.

"How much do high school football coaches make in Texas? I hear it's a shitload."

Eric glances at Adrian, waiting for the professor to correct the student's language, but he doesn't. College sure has changed since Eric attended. His first clue should have been the number of kids with baseball caps on their heads. At A&M, if he had sat down in a lecture hall with a cap still on his head, the professor would have taken it off his head and smacked him with it.

"Uh…well….that varies widely from school to school and district to district," Eric answers, "from position to position – "

"- How much did _you_ make?" the kid interrupts.

Eric glances helplessly at Adrian, who holds up a hand, "Okay, that's a little too personal, but maybe Eric can ballpark coach's salaries for us."

"I though you said this was economics, not finance," Eric whispers.

"Most of these kids know they aren't going to make it as professional athletes. They want to know what their other options are," he whispers back.

"The average head high school football coach in Texas earns just under $100,000," Eric answers, "And the highest paid coach I know of earned about $155,000." There are a number of surprised whistles. He holds out a hand. "But you have to understand, that includes whatever they're doing besides coaching." He taps down the finger of one hand with another. "Full-time teacher," he taps down another finger, "full-time athletic director," he taps down another finger, "whatever. No one lives off a coach's stipend alone. And when you add all that together, it's a 75, 85-hour a week job during football season, 55 hours a week off-season. And those are head coach salaries. Assistant positions are a lot less. There are less than 2,000 head high school football coaches in all of the U.S. Out of who knows how many hundreds of thousands of ex-college and ex-high school players wanting to be coaches. It's a job where you have to start small and work your way up for years."

"So," another kid calls out, "do you make more now as an athletic consultant?"

"Uh…"He glances at Adrian again, but gets no help. "Well…probably more _per hour_. But not _more_." Nowhere near as much. "I don't work that much," he admits. "I…uh…I wanted to spend more time with the family."

Thankfully, the questions soon switch away from how much he used to make or currently makes. The next kid he calls on, a little punk with a backward baseball cap on, asks, "What's the economic motivation behind icing the kicker in football?"

"The economic motivation behind it?" Eric echoes.

"Yeah, I mean, it doesn't really work," the kid says, "according to Moskowitz and Wertheim's analysis in _Scorecasting_."

Eric has no idea who Moscowwhatzit and Wethooey are. "Well, sometimes it works."

"Not when you control for the distance of the field-goal attempt. They found kickers kick around the same percentages whether they were iced or not. So why employ the tactic when the success is debatable?"

"Well…" Eric clears his throat. "When you're in the trenches, sometimes the picture looks – "

"- I have a theory," the kid interrupts.

"And what's your theory, Mr. Hamilton?" Adrian asks.

"Ultimately I think it comes down to the fact that the negative payoffs to the coach are weighted much more heavily if he doesn't ice the kicker." He points to Eric. "You pay more."

Eric shrugs. "When I was a coach I tried to do what was best for the team, what was best for the win, and not to try to let the threat of people's reactions get to me – "

"- Or the threat of not getting your contract renewed?" young Mr. Hamilton asks.

"Yeah, I _tried_ not to. But I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to say those thoughts never influenced me in anyway. You may have a point there."

Several hands are up now, so he points to another one. It's a girl this time, a volleyball player, he's willing to guess. "Did you ever develop scoring models to analyze the skills of particular players?"

Now Eric gets a little excited. He didn't know that was economics. "Uh, yeah, yeah I did." He talks about the various models he used, with Adrian occasionally interrupting to throw out statistical terminology Eric's not familiar with.

The next kid he calls on asks, "As a coach, how often did you use SWOT analysis to gauge your opponents?"

Eric tilts his head slightly. "SWAT analysis?"

"SWOT," Adrian tells him. "It stands for Strengths and Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats."

"Well, sure, we analyzed those things all the time. We didn't have a fancy acronym for it." Eric follows up on questions about SWOT analysis and is then asked about the economic rationale behind schools funding stadiums.

"Well…I mean…football can be a huge revenue draw. For some schools. Maybe not so much for…" Eric stops himself from saying Braemore. " _All_ schools. And you can rent the stadiums out for other things. Concerts. Whatnot. And people coming to the stadium, using it, that can attract business to your town. Sales tax revenue. Whatever."

Adrian slides off the table and expands on what Eric said, throwing out terms like "cost-benefit analysis," "economies of scale," "ROI," "opportunity costs," and so forth, and by the end, Eric's not quite sure whether Adrian is for or against schools building stadiums.

The questioning goes on for a good hour, and Eric gets into the groove of it and even starts to enjoy the exchange for a while. A lot of these kids seem to know what they're talking about, like maybe they've actually _learned_ something in this class. It makes him miss teaching just a little bit.

When the students have finally filtered out of the auditorium, Adrian thanks him for coming and hands him a form. "Just fill that out and drop it at the Dean of Admissions and you'll get your check."

"I didn't think Tami handled finances."

"She doesn't, but she'll know who does and get it there for you. I assume you're taking her to lunch?"

"Yeah. Might as well. Got the sitter for another hour. You know…this class sounds interesting. Maybe I ought to audit it."

"You're welcome to. But you'll have to clear that with the Dean of Admissions." He winks. "Hey, you want to get a drink sometime? I live about five miles from you two. We could meet at Dinky's Sports Bar."

So he knows exactly where Tami lives, too? Eric supposes that probably would come up in conversation. "Yeah, sure. Sometime. We'll figure it out."

On his way to Tami's office, he buys a rose from a kid hawking them on the street, and walks with a much more relzed step toward her building.


	11. Chapter 11

Tami holds up one finger when Eric walks into the office because she's on the phone. It must be an important call, because she's standing up as she talks. Tami's professional voice washes over him like a hum as he looks around her office. There's her framed diploma from Texas A&M noting her magna cum laude honors. She always blamed Eric for not making summa cum laude. He was, she claims, too much of a distraction. He eked out of college with only a 2.8 GPA himself, but it hasn't seemed to hold him back any.

Tami finally hangs up, so he goes over and extends her the rose.

"Aww, isn't that sweet. I'm going to put that right in this vase, sugar." She plucks it into a metal travel coffee cup and grabs her briefcase. "Now where are you taking me for lunch?"

"The sky's the limit. Or the $150 you need to make sure I get paid. Whichever comes first."

She laughs, tells him to leave the paperwork on her desk, and she'll get it to the right person.

They split a bottle of wine with lunch, which might not be the best idea, given that she has to go back to work. But he doesn't have to pick up Gracie until dinner time. He talks to her about the class and listens to her day and by the time he gets her back to her office, she's a little buzzed. He locks the door behind them and pulls the shades.

"What do you think you're doing, sweetheart?" Tami asks him as she sets her briefcase down. He looks at her desk, and then down at her high heels, and then up again at her skirt. "Oh hell no," she tells him.

"C'mon."

"I have work to do. And these walls aren't that thick."

He sighs. "How about a goodbye kiss, then?"

He gets more of a goodbye make out session, but when he starts to unbutton her blouse, she pushes him away.

"Sobered up now?" he asks.

"I was never not sober," she insists as she plops down into her chair. It rolls back a bit. "So you want to audit Adrian's class?"

"Yeah, think you can set that up for me?"

[*]

Eric's consulting business begins to gradually take off, although it's still a part-time gig, leaving him plenty of time to be home for Gracie when she needs him. The money doesn't match his old salary, but it's close. One class audit turns into another class audit which turns into another, at which point Adrian, who has become a friend to him, asks, "Why don't you just go back to college and get your Master's in Sports Management?"

"They have that _here_?" Eric asks.

"Well, not here, but there are a lot of Universities in and around Philadelphia."

When Gracie is in second grade, Eric becomes a full-time student again. On the eve of his first day of school, Tami teases him from the master bathroom as she washes up for bed, "no stopping by the sorority house on your way home."

She slides under the covers with him and kisses him. "Who thought you'd be going back to _school_?"

"I know. I hated school. But speaking of who'd have thought it…Yeah?"

Tami beams. She's being seriously considered for the position of Vice President of Student Affairs at Braemore. It will be a position that allows her to make more use of her counseling experience. "It's been a long strange road, hasn't it, hon?"

He slides down under the covers and wraps her up in his arms. "Well, I don't think our journey's over quite yet."

In the quiet of their Philadelphia home, with the crickets chirping cheerfully in the backyard, they fall into the familiar rhythms learned from a lifetime of lovemaking, and fall asleep flesh to flesh, dreaming of their future together.

 **THE END**

 ** _A/N:_** Okay, I apologize. I know this ending was completely abrupt and this story totally undeveloped. But I encountered a problem here. I always start my fanfiction with a general idea, and it always ends up writing itself. The plot just unravels as I write and ideas grow on ideas. But with this story, for the first time, that didn't happen. I don't know why. I don't know if I've just been away from FNL too long and it's been off the air too long so the passion has waned, or I've just written too much FNL fanfic over the years so nothing sounds original to me anymore. But I wanted to wrap this up _somehow_ rather than leaving it hanging in an "In Progress" position with people waiting on it for weeks and weeks. If this is the first of my FNL fanfics you've read, please don't write off my other stories based on it. Take a look at my profile and choose another story – there are lots of good ones! And happy reading.


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